Garry Owen: Algarve villa is safe.. but I'm looking for more ups than downs in 2014

RECORD SPORT racing expert Garry Owen had an eventful 2013 - and he's hoping for more happy moments in the next 12 months.

Ryan Mania won the Grand National on Auroras Encore, the first Scotsman to do so in 117 years. (Photo: Alex Livesey/Getty Images)

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IF, like me, you suffer from ‘black spots’ after eight or nine pints of foaming ale, let me refresh your memory parts with what went down in 2013.

Having stuck my sword in the ground with Bobs Worth, selling my nice wee villa in Portugal and my youngest daughter on eBay, it was a huge relief to be able to buy one of them back.

Although March 15 did give me some moments of discomfort. With Geraghty eight lengths down I felt a tingling sensation in my left arm with three fences to jump in the Gold Cup.

I explained my symptoms to a friend with a medical background, suggesting I might be on the verge of going toes up but was assured by Dr Strangelove it was not a mild stroke at all but quite probably a heart attack and to stop annoying him as he was cheering on Sir Des Champs.

As history relates, Bobs Worth stormed up the hill, I bought my gaff in the Algarve back, got an MOT for my ticker and my doctor chum is still paying off Paddy Power.

Onwards to Aintree and the highlight of Liverpool was not the National but the bronzed Scouser goddesses who seem determined every year to wear as little as possible on Ladies’ Day despite Baltic temperatures. The National winner escaped me again, but fair play to Ryan Mania booting home 66-1 shot Auroras Encore for Sue Smith to give it a wee bit of a Scottish connection.

May found me at HQ and I was all over Toronado like a rash for the 2000 Guineas.

Bolger’s Dawn Approach was unbeaten in six starts coming to Newmarket but I fancied the Hannon colt big time. It looked good for a couple of seconds but the son of High Chaparral stopped to walk in the last furlong, finishing fourth.

Robbed when just held by the Guineas winner in the St James’s Palace, Toronado proved he was the business when nailing the Irish colt in the Sussex at Goodwood.

I knew I should have gone to Hamilton when Hannon/Hughes bolted up on Sky Lantern in the 1000 Guineas.

The last time I backed the Derby winner, apart from the magnificent Sea The Stars that is, was when John Reid was getting the leg up on Dr Devious.

You couldn’t say I was filled with confidence in June and you could have given me several picks and I still couldn’t predict O’Brien’s Ruler Of The World. They say there’s no such thing as a bad Derby winner, but the Galileo colt was then trounced in the Irish Derby, beaten by a Japanese second stringer in the Niel, hammered by Treve in the Arc and third to Farhh and Cirrus Des Aigles in the Champion Stakes at Ascot. Not good enough I’m afraid.

With 20-1 shot Talent living up to her name in the Oaks, it was a profitable Epsom for the books. Ascot was carnage and I’ll never darken the Royal Enclosure again, even if The Queen and her staff do reinstate me.

York is the place to be in August and the Ebor Meeting is streets ahead of the nouvea riche nonsense at Ascot. On your list of 10 things to do before you’re ‘pan bread’ put down Ebor just under the Cheltenham Festival.

I hope this has brought back some happy memories, it has for me. Let’s hope there’s plenty more to come in 2014. All the best.